Gorillabuns

creativity

If you were so inclined to visit my home, you would be bombarded with children's masterpieces at every turn. Lost on your way to the restroom? Follow the multi-colored, cut-out faces onto your destination. Pictures are taped with the skill of a four and a half year old; dispensing a roll on each masterpiece.

At times, the gallery can get out of control with paintings darting into your line of vision haphazardly. Other times, the show needs to be reinvented and renovated but most of the time, the exhibitions remind me of burgeoning creativity barely contained.

Creativity of which I hope they never lose.

in sickness and nonhealth

We are sad and blue. and sick. Depressed our concert has been canceled and more than annoyed that we've been infested with every parasite available within a two hundred mile radius of our bodies for two plus weeks.

I'm sure, we'll be our happy jolly selves soon. Until then, we will be wearing surgical masks for the remainder of the year.

onto a subject i love discussing -- ME!!!

remember my last post? the post where neil suggested we interview someone new and different? i interviewed and mortified sizzle. surely you remember the haphazard questions i asked which most would say were waaayy too personal in nature and considered TMI by the best of interrogators (really, who would these interrogators be? the mafia? the FBI? (sorry sizz, i have no sensor button and for this i apologize!)) what is with all the extra parenthesis? didn't you know i was the queen of the side note? as in extra parenthesis and the illegal use of commas and dashes. if you didn't, get ready - prepare yourself for the onslaught!

anyhoo....well, it's my turn and jill of glossy veneer has taken on the task to interview me. boy do i love talking about myself. it's my favorite subject and one - i'm quite the expert about discussing. what you see is what you get and if given half the chance - i could go on and on and on..... (as in HELL NO! i won't go into group therapy! i don't care about other people's problems! i only care about my own! me droning on about my crappy life...what? my insurance has run out? and group therapy is the only thing i can afford? well, i guess i'm cured. baa-bye!)   

sadly, a true story. damn those pesky insurance companies!

let's the party started!

1. First off, the blog name 'Gorillabuns'.  Where did that come from, story behind the name?

it's really a boring explanation and the name of my blog is one i wish i had the foresight in really thinking through the name before i hit the publish button.

it all started when i was pregnant with daughter #1, i completed a funky email/questionnaire about substituting letters in your name for corresponding words from a list. my name came back as poopsy gorillabuns. when the said child was born - she had a mane like no other. on her back. daughter #2 was born a year later and again, she was born with a hairy back and a mushtasheoo that rivaled any 16 year old boy's budding peach fuzz. rich and i found this quite funny since we ARE SO NOT HAIRY!!! like nary a hair on our bodies - funny.

again, if i had it to do all over again, i would've thought more about my bloggy name if i would have known i was going to hang out so long.

2. Why does your 'About' page not having anything about you?  ;-)

actually, i've had something in the que but you made me realize, i'm entirely too stupid to actually hit "check mark" in the menu to publish my bio. so here's what i wrote for my intro when i was going to blogher - as lame as it might be:

my name is shana, it rhymes with banana.... i have an obsession with ALL makeup hence, the three drawers chock full of goodness and the resulting brain damage from a brutal take down by my irish, catholic babysitter at the tender age of 5. needless to say, revlon's "love that red" lipstick, mascara and coty "powder pink" nail polish do not add to the luster of an old fashioned hardwood floor. i had a major case of shaken child's syndrome which subsequently resulted in my wearing such glitter and gold two days out of the week.

i acquired a fluffy' feel good' art and psychology degree which led to many jobs, like turning bank robbers into the FBI and selling drugs for great pay. i pretty much underachieved in all of my professions - including my current position of parenting.

my life-long goal is to be a private investigator and/+/-/or FBI agent. because? i like to shoot guns.... dirty harriet style. until then, i'll revisit "hannibal" and dissect my drive-way murder scenes comprised of burger king sweet and sour packets spattered upon oxidized metallic paint vehicles and '76 chevy nova oil skids. and yes, these are real crime scenes in my hood (please see old posts for explanations....)

the title of my site is gorillabuns. this namesake is due to my chillin's propensity for hairiness and their abnormally primal behavior.

i have an obsession with cheap watermelon vodka and diet red bull. i am the all-time, kick-ass, crappy karaoke performer. i own such a machine and will sing to my husband in order to have make-up sex and mortify my guests with my lounge-like behavior. beware.....

i'm the ice-breaker of many a friendship, STRONGLY dislike people who drive with cell phones glued to their ears, patrons who don't push their empty shopping carts to the end of the shopping cart line, close talkers, and freaks who stand in my personal space. don't get me started on people who hug me when i'm not cocked and fully loaded.

otherwise, i'm sure, you'd love me. like, really, REALLY love me.

again, maybe i should re-edit this synopsis but alas, i'm too lazy to think of anything more exciting.

3. How long have you been blogging?  What made you start blogging?

i started in 2005. all the crap i wrote for the first year was just that - crap! actually, i might have started earlier but i deleted that crap too. if you make me think about it; i might have to go and delete that whole year and then some, but i'm too lazy to actually go on a witch hunt. who wants to read - testing...1...2...3.... i'm trying to figure out how to post - nothing.....

how i started blogging - i would credit whoorl. she sent me a few links of blogs she happened to read and then a few more over a months time. being the ever frustrated non-practicing artist, i thought i should try my hand at writing - even though i haven't been dedicated enough to write a journal in 10 years. she started a month or so after me and well, the rest is history. she's quite famous now and me? not-so-much.

4. What keeps you blogging?

i like seeing proof - i'm still living and breathing and not dead. (let's not discuss my ever impending birthday next month.)

5. Do you have any specific boundaries on things/information you won't discuss on your blog?

my husband's family. while i think they would make QUITE interesting blogging fodder, i still have to partake in holiday meals with them and i just don't want to deal with that kind of drama.

and yes, i have blogged about them in the past but those stories are long gone with the quick punch of a delete button in the hopes that someone didn't get too bored and type my name in a yahoo search bar.

6. What do you feel is the biggest challenge you face personally each day?

finding money to our bills. watching and waiting for the clock to strike 5 o'clock - cocktail hour!

7. What do you feel is your strongest asset?

the ability to not take myself seriously. i'm a kind and caring friend and actually, a pretty good wife and parent. believe it or not.

8. Let's run through a few favorites: favorite food, drink, color, scent, vacation destination, movie, musician?

favorite food: it's a cross between a plate of cheese fries with bacon, chives and ranch dressing (did i mention i USED to be a vegetarian?) and pesto tortellini with a homemade Caesar salad. (i never said i was a healthy chick.)

drink: need i really answer this? any rot-gut vodka and a diet energy drink additive added to the mix. and diet dr. pepper. breakfast of the gods.

color: black. because it hides my lovely lady lumps.

scent: the smell of my girls' necks - they have yet to acquire stink glands and i spray them down with whatever eau de body spray i can find. (i have a VERY sensitive nose by the way. usually, my snoot let's me know i'm in the family kind of way before any pregnancy test shows positive results.)

vacation destination: we haven't been on a vacation (new orleans was our last) since our first anniversary (let's not count the family gathering to disney world in 2006 where i had an almost mental breakdown); so, i really am not equipped to answer this question, since one might need to have money and an overnight babysitter to obtain such a dream.

movie: 16 candles - because i love "jake ryan," and like to scream his name whenever i see my friend's five year old child - though no one seems to understand why i do so. man, jake ryan was HOTTT!!!

say anything - "She gave me a pen. I gave her my heart, she gave me a pen."
is one of the best lines of all time.

valley girl, silence of the lambs, donnie darko, the departed - oh, my god, i can't  choose just one!

musician? anything - dave grohl - hence, i'm going to see "the foo's" next week and my life will be complete after such adventure. (have i mentioned that everlong WILL be played at my funeral?)

9. I heard an interviewer on the radio ask this question of K.T. Tunstall once and it struck me as so completely bizarre, yet funny.  I'm going to ask the same thing of you: If you had to hide an elephant, where would you hide it?

first, where the hell did this elephant come from and why do i have to hide it? is it something i purchased in hopes my husband didn't notice it's existence? maybe in a huge dumpster bin behind a crappy chinese restaurant? that is, if i could somehow lift it into the big dumpster.

otherwise, i really hope to never have to deal with this situation since dumbo made me cry - because of his mother and dumbo was pretty freakin' cute.


10. Total Nonsense: Are you more rock, paper or scissors?

a pair of scissors. my mother would attest,  even at a tender young age, i would leave little pieces of paper scattered in a trail of my wake.

Sizzle

Neil came up with a genius plan to learn more about other bloggers in the great big world of bloggydom who may or may not be BIG TIME or saddled neatly in your current feed burner. His deduction is: everyone IS someone and they deserve their moment to shine. To be heard. To be discovered. Basically, everyone deserves their 15 minutes.

I commented on his site and much to my delight, Sizzle commented right after me. I will be asking random questions of the most fabulous Miss Sizzle. First, I must start with the undeniable fact; Miss Sizzle might quite possibly be one of the first commenters on my site and for some ungodly reason, she has stuck with me through horrible grammatical and punctuation errors, drunken posts (who am I kidding, most of my posts are drunken mish-mash), and histrionic ramblings. She makes you feel like she is your best friend through thick and thin (and believe me, I've had a LOT of thin on my part.) She's steadfast and true and sadly, I've never met her in person. I hope to remedy this situation one day.

Quite honestly, I have the distinct advantage of reading her for the past 2+ years and STILL have a few questions I don't think I have had the pleasure of reading the answers to or knowing the end sum of them. So hopefully, you'll learn more about her and what a wonderful, kind and thoughtful person she remains to be (since she's all popular and stuff).

A person anyone would be quite privileged to call a friend.

So…I'm posting the Q & A for your perusal; just in case you are a lazy person and don't feel like hitting a highlighted link.

Let the questions commence! (note: her answers are in bold.)

1) Knowing what we do (or some may not) about the history of your relationship with your father; what would you say/do if you had one more minute with him? (Yes, this is such a loaded question and I ask because I have such HUGE unspoken issues with an alcoholic father as well. But WAIT this questionnaire is all about you, isn't it?)

I'd like to think I'd give him the biggest hug ever, tell him I love him and hopefully, that I forgive him.

(Woah, way to make me tear up at the first question, friend!)

2) What is your one biggest regret?

Not being there when my Dad died.

3) What is your greatest extravagance?

It used to be getting my hair done before I met my friend Streets and she hooks me up with a great dealio. I pay $25 to get my brows waxed. Is that extravagant? And my favorite food is sushi which I prefer to eat as often as possible. I'd say that's a luxury.

4) Okay, you may not want to answer this one but I'm going to ask anyway, because I just have to ask. You have mentioned in past that you have had only one big, true "O" and it occurred with the "Tomato." Have you since experienced such a pleasure? And if so, I won't ask with whom (because I do have some lady-like tendencies)

Yes, my first and only "O" was with my first boyfriend who later came out of the closet. (Hi, Tomato!) While he wears this truth as a badge of honor, I'm pretty frustrated and embarrassed about it. It's not for lack of trying! And yes, maybe I need to go to a sex therapist. Because seriously, this lack of O business is getting really, really old.

*This is no way says that my lovers have not given it their best effort. Many have. Some were just jerks. Like that one guy who said, "What's the point then?" AS he was having sex with me. Yeah. You. You're an asshole.

5) Don't even ask why I'm asking this question – maybe because I had a conversation about this very question with my husband the other night and he had no interest in knowing my answer. Why? Why don't you want to know? I want to! I SHOULD know… So, here it goes, feel free to delete if you want to: How many people have you slept with in you life? (If your mother is reading this, you might want to delete this one.)

Slept with = intercourse? Let me count. . . 17. But there was a period where I dated a lot and that number may or may not be higher. Ahem! Thank goodness for oral sex or this number would definitely be much higher. (Hi Mom! I practice safer sex!)

6) Quite obviously, I have sex on the brain so I'll ask this one in addition – where has the most interesting place you've had sex?

Depends on what you consider interesting. And what you consider sex. Backseat of a car seems so cliché…but it wasn't my car and there was a baby's car seat in the back with us. Cramped? Yes.

7) What is your favorite curse word?

Fuck. (But I also say "balls!" a lot.)

8) What is your most treasured possession?

I don't put a lot of emphasis on material objects but I suppose my ring from my Mom (she used to wear it when I was a kid) and my Grandmother's ring. I don't "possess" my kitties but I treasure them and their sweet, spazzy, furball love.

9) What is your greatest fear?

Besides falling from great heights? Hurting people's feelings unnecessarily? Being forced to eat Jello?

Mostly it is that I will come to my time to die and feel as though I have not lived.

(Which is from one of my favorite quotes: "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I have not lived." -Thoreau)

10) How many of your ex-boyfriends are you still friends with?

3 "boyfriends" (Hi Dumpling, Tomato and Mikey!) but the number goes to 7 if we include those I went on dates with but never got serious enough with to call them "boyfriend."

11) What is the first thing you notice in a man?

Physically: eyes and smile. Personality: sense of humor.

Also? Bad hugger? Bad sign!

12) What is one thing you love about yourself?

Personality: My sense of humor and ability to laugh at myself. Physically: My four eyes.

13) Do you think being exposed to the Catholic religion at such a tender age totally scarred you/fucked you up? Made you believe/disbelieve in God? (Surely, I didn't make up you being raised Catholic, right?)

I was raised Catholic (good memory!) – Irish Catholic Mom, Agnostic Dad. While I don't think it emotionally scarred me, it did shape how I see the world. I like to think I've taken the good from that and dropped the rest. I am no longer a practicing Catholic even though I consider myself a spiritual person and attend service as often as I can at a church of religious science. I like learning about people's beliefs and feel that we all find our own sense of "faith" in our own time.

I was lucky to attend an all girls Catholic high school. (Thanks for getting a job there, Mom, so we could afford for me to go.) I had a great education there and it helped me get ahead in college because of how rigorous it was.

14) How long have you known "The Fella?" and when EXACTLY did you know you should venture into a relationship with him?

People have asked me this question off-blog and I forget I never wrote about the beginning of our relationship…just that first kiss. Next month we will have been together for six months. Originally when we met (on line, via a locals dating site) we were both not looking for something "serious" so we said we were "casually dating." A few days after meeting, I received a text from him saying, "Save me from casual dating." Apparently he was out on a date that wasn't going so well. I later explained that while I wanted to be supportive, I didn't actually want to receive texts while he was on a date with someone else. It was probably then that I realized I kind of wanted him all to myself. That there was something promising between us. That I wanted at least a shot at making it more than just casual.

We met while I was in the midst of a bad heartbreak and he actually was incredibly supportive through that. One thing I love about us as a couple is that we are really great friends first and foremost. We look out for each other, respect each other, and have a relationship based on honesty. There is nothing I cannot tell him. This makes me feel very loved and incredibly safe.

Have I mentioned he's really wonderful? And a super great kisser?

(end gush)

15) How did you come up with the blog name Sizzle?

An ex of mine used to call me "Sizzle." And while he is not one of the three I am still friends with (for good reason!), he did leave me with this parting gift. Much better than leaving me with an STD, dontcha think?

16) You have mentioned your desire to not push out a kidlet or two. After reading what a wonderful relationship you have with Finn, I wonder if you would reconsider this decision if the right moment presented itself? Planned or unplanned.

I will tell you, I'm not so keen on the whole carrying the baby around for 9 months and pushing it out of my vagina. I've seen that shit up close and woah! I am very impressed with any woman who has given birth or who is a Mom by any means. I've always thought that I would end up being a foster parent, actually. I guess because I never saw myself getting married. I figured it was either/or. I find the love of my life and live happily ever after… or I adopt/foster a child and they are actually the love of my life. I suppose I should rethink that. . .

I've loved many men in my life but have never had that perfect combo of timing, readiness, and desire to have my own kidlet. I adore kids though. And my nephew is my favorite little tyke in the whole world. I'm crazy about him.

i'm smart enough - no, wait.....

i consider myself to be a pretty smart chick. well, at the very least smart enough. to get by. i know a whole lotta shit about absolutely nothing and i would give you a run for your money on old school music trivia (don't even think about commenting about most of the craptastic post before the end; because i might have to kill you. and i don't have enough gas money to come and find you - to do the deed) but not enough to be a true expert in any given subject. yes, i've been tested, tested some more and then re-tested (say what?) let's just say; i wasn't a candidate to ride the short bus - just the plain, regular boring bus with all the average-kiddos.

i survive - just barely.

except when it comes to being a parent. when teaching and modeling/molding shoots itself into the equation, i am so inept. like, VERY inept. like, you are going to flunk life - inept.

fast forward...wait...no...rewind....30-something years ago......

my 28'ish mother sitting on the bed with a set of stiff multiplication cards in hand; drilling my stupid ass multiplication tables over and over and OVER AND OVER.....i remember this one day like it was yesterday, she was wearing a sweet tan jumper with a shiny polyester, bronze, tied blouse underneath. imagine this sweet woman with the patience of well...i don't know who....me? screaming; "we just went over this! 3 X 3 is 9! (i say this as i check the correct calculations with my handy dandy calculator) for the love of god! why aren't you getting this? are you even paying attention?"  i proceed to cry and freeze-up because we are dealing with numbers and i don't do numbers.

as you can see from my mom's reaction, i come from a long line of impatient teachers - throwing up their arms in air while screaming, "what the hell am i going to do with you? are you going to succeed in life or are you going to ride the pole to idiom?" not that we would EVER say this to our kids; we just think it - silently.

now fast forward to today. me sitting patiently (or what i think is patient) with my oldest. perusing the year in review. A-F; 1-10. her name. simple shit. while reviewing the basics, she looks at me like i've been reciting a complex set of verbs in latin complete with trying to demonstrate the first few letters of the alphabet in russian.

"what's that?"

"what do you mean what's that?"

"i don't know what you are writing in that red pen!"

well, at least you are getting the color red part right.

"i'm writing an A FOR GOD'S SAKES!!!  and 1 COMES BEFORE 2!"

"i simply don't know what you mean."

"well, you know what i mean when i'm counting to five when you are in trouble! you mean to tell me you can't count to five?"

"uumm... no."

me? grinding my teeth. wondering where we are failing here. how am i going to afford the "special" tutoring she's obviously going to need in the not-so-near future.

"you mean to tell me you don't know how to count to 10? or your abc's?"

"no?"

"for god's sakes! i was almost reading at your age! you don't know how to count to 10?"

i sit in my uncomfortable seat for what seems a span of five minutes. realizing - i'm not sure which is worse - her in an expensive private pre-k program learning absolutely nothing or me home-schooling them teaching absolutely nothing.

i go with me. homeschooling. at least i can say it wasn't all my fault when she's 16 and can't read. or can't count to 20. or tie her shoes. it was the school's fault.

i'll take responsibility for the attitude and anxiety issues she'll have from the end result.

anyone have any suggestions? on teaching - not personality/anxiety problems.